40 songs from 2009

needless to say, the release of georgie's favorite music of the past calendar year has a similar impact on the music industry as the yearly publication of the michelin guide on the restaurant business. hopefully, unlike in years past, an exclusion from this list will only engender minor bodily injuries and tepid attempts at character assassination.

rest assured of two facts:

(1) these ARE the best 40 songs of the year, and there is no room for debate.

(2) the 3 guys pictured above in white pants DO comprise perhaps the greatest band of the 20th century (and a strawberry milkshake goes to the first person who correctly guesses their identity).


VOLUME 1:

------ Song ---------------- Band/Artist --------------------- Album

1) Beginner's Luck ------------ EELS ------------------------- Hombre Lobo

2) Drivetime ------------------ Echo & the Bunnymen -------- The Fountain

3) Lenin -------------------- Arcade Fire ------------------- Dark Was the Night
4) 1901 ------------------- Phoenix -------------- Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix
5) The Heartbreak Rides ------ A.C. Newman ---------------- Get Guilty

6) Devils in Boston ------------ Samantha Crain ------------- Songs in the Night

7) Annan Water --------------- The Decemberists ------------- The Hazards of

8) Relator ---------------- Pete Yorn & Scarlett Johansson ----- The Break Up

9) Man Named Truth ----- Monsters of Folk ---------------- Monsters of Folk

10) Okay ------------------- Venice Is Sinking ---------------- Azar
11) The Horizon Is A Beltway-The Low Anthem-Oh My God, Charlie Darwin
12) The Walls Are Falling Down ---- Fanfarlo -------------------- Reservoir
13) It Don't Move Me ------------- Peter Bjorn and John ------- Living Thing

14) My Unusual Friend ----------- Fruit Bats ----------------- The Ruminant Band

15) French Navy ----------------- Camera Obscura ------------ My Mauldin Career
16) At the Cut -------------------- The Cave Singers ----------- Welcome Joy

17) To Save Me ------------------ M. Ward -------------------- Hold Time

18) Mismanaged Skies ------ Beatbeat Whisper --------- Wonder Continental

19) Move You ----- Anya Marina ------- Slow & Steady Seduction: Phase II

20) I’ll Fight ----------------- Wilco ---------------------- Wilco (The Album)

VOLUME 2:

--- Song ---------------------Band/Artist --------------- Album
1) Lisztomania ---------- Phoenix ------------- Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix
2) Train Song ------------ Feist and Ben Gibbard -------- Dark Was the Night
3) The Right Place ----------- Monsters of Folk ------------ Monsters of Folk
4) Hindsight -------------- Built to Spill ------------------ There Is No Enemy
5) All The Kings Men -------- Wild Beasts ------------------ Two Dancers
6) House of Mirrors ---------- Doves ---------------------- Kingdom of Rust
7) Kiss With a Fist ----------- Florence and the Machine ---- Lungs
8) Bellyfulla ------------------ Ramona Falls ---------------- Intuit
9) Oh No --------------------- Andrew Bird ---------------- Noble Beast
10) So Far Around the Bend ---- The National ------------- Dark Was the Night
11) Fee Da Da Dee ---------- The Guggenheim Grotto ----- Happy The Man
12) Take A Minute -------------- K'naan ------------------- Troubadour
13) You and I ------------------ Wilco -------------------- Wilco (The Album)
14) Honey in the Sun ---------- Camera Obscura ----------- My Mauldin Career

15) Home -----------Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros-Self-titled
16) I Am Goodbye -------------- Bonnie "Prince" Billy ---------- Beware

17) Pulling On a Line ------------ Great Lake Swimmers -------Lost Channels

18) Border Reiver ------------ Mark Knopfler ------------ Get Lucky
19) Kettering ------------------ The Antlers -------------- Hospice

20) Draw the Line --------- David Gray ------------------ Draw the Line

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[if you have provided me your address, the united states postal service will be in receipt of hard copies of this compilation over the next few days.]

lost coastlines (okkervil river)

will sheff (of okkervil river) and a.c. newman (of the new pornographers) perform "lost coastlines," the opening track from the latest okkervil river album, "the stand ins":

thank you, william k., for the recommendation.

i am obsessed with this song:

best music of 2008

2008 was a solid (but not great) year in music. The biggest theme for me was the arrival of several fantastic new bands. The first albums by Fleet Foxes, Frightened Rabbit, and Bon Iver were some of my favorites of the year. Noteworthy discoveries of bands that I did not know prior to this year (and who produced solid albums in 2008) included Thievery Corporation, MGMT, DeVotchKa, The Black Keys, The Walkmen, and Blitzen Trapper. The depth of new material, however, was not as good as last year or most years from the past decade.

I firmly believe that we are currently in a musical era that compares favorably with the late 1960's and early 1970's, i.e. perhaps the best era of music of all time. To be clear, there are certainly no bands today as good as The Beatles, Pink Floyd, The Rolling Stones, or Bob Dylan (well, except of course for Bob himself, who is still putting out good music), but the quantity of high-quality music in the current era is quite impressive and rivals that of any era. My favorite bands from the past ten years - Radiohead, Wilco, Arcade Fire, My Morning Jacket, etc. - are loudly building résumés that will probably one day rival the greats of the past.

Musical preferences are certainly as subjective as tastes in movies, books, or romantic partners. I love to debate the value of this movie or that book, but ultimately, you like what you like, and your own views will (more often than not) make more sense to you than the opinions of others. That being said, just because you might not agree with my tastes in music in general (what a tragedy!), my hope is that you will still enjoy many of these songs and bands.

Without further adieu, here are my favorite songs of2008:

VOLUME ONE
Song ---------------------------------Band
1 Black River Killer ----------------Blitzen Trapper
2 The Bones Of You ---------------Elbow
3 Calling And Not Calling My Ex ---Okkervil River
4 Change Is Hard ------------------She & Him
5 El Pueblo Unido -----------------Thievery Corporation
6 Electric Feel ---------------------MGMT
7 Gobbledigook --------------------Sigur Ros
8 Golden Age --------------------- TV on the Radio
9 Hot Night Hounds--------------- Annuals
10 Jesus Of The Moon------------- Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds
11 Librarian----------------------- My Morning Jacket
12 M79---------------------------- Vampire Weekend
13 On the Water------------------- The Walkmen
14 Ragged Wood------------------- Fleet Foxes
15 Skinny Love-------------------- Bon Iver
16 So He Won't Break-------------- The Black Keys
17 The Twist----------------------- Frightened Rabbit
18 Undone------------------------- DeVotchKa
19 Walls---------------------------- Beck
20 White Winter Hymnal------------Fleet Foxes

VOLUME TWO
Song ----------------------------------------Band
1 I Will Possess Your Heart------------------ Deathcab For Cutie
2 Old Old Fashioned ------------------------ Frightened Rabbit
3 Tiger Mountain Peasant Song------------- Fleet Foxes
4 Good Arms Vs. Bad Arms -----------------Frightened Rabbit
5 Time To Pretend ------------------------- MGMT
6 Weekend Wars --------------------------- MGMT
7 Psychotic Girl ---------------------------- The Black Keys
8 Furr ------------------------------------- Blitzen Trapper
9 Flume ------------------------------------ Bon Iver
10 Danny Callahan-------------------------- Conor Oberst
11 Along The Way -------------------------- Devotchka
12 Head Honcho ---------------------------- Devotchka
13 Hymn #101 ----------------------------- Joe Pug
14 Highly Suspicious ------------------------ My Morning Jacket
15 Lie Down Here (And Be My Girl) ---------Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds
16 Inni Mer Syngur Vitleysingur ------------Sigur Ros
17 Hare Krsna ----------------------------- Thievery Corporation
18 Many Shades of Black --------------------The Raconteurs

If you would like a copy of these two CDs, please email me, and if I don't go to school with you, let me know your home or work address, and I will mail you a copy.

Thanks for all the recommendations throughout the past year that have helped me discovery many of these bands. Keep 'em coming!

fleet foxes

i really like fleet foxes' debut self-titled album. they remind me of a folksier, more orchestral, and slower version of my morning jacket. check them out ASAP.

the most talented french rapper on the east coast?

the spanish mime was a brilliant touch, don't you think?

another great mixed CD

georgie is always looking for new music! please email me at dayofthefight@gmail.com with any music recommendations. thank you to my friend j.k. for the CD below:

Song Artist
Gemini (Birthday Song) - Why?
Mansard Roof - Vampire Weekend
Ski Jumper - Hafdis Huld
The Opposite of Hallelujah - Jens Lekman
I Wish I Had An Evil Twin - The Magnetic Fields
Seventeen Years - Ratatat
Consoler of the Lonely - The Raconteurs
Everything is Exactly What It Seems - Michael Flynn
Seventeen Dirty Magazines - Modern Skirts
Going to a Town - Rufus Wainwright
100 Days, 100 Nights - Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings
Soft - Kings of Leon
Paris is Burning - St. Vincent
your ex-lover is dead - Stars
Swimming Pools - Thao Nguyen & the Get Down Stay Down
The Reasons - The Weakerthans
The Jeopardy of Contentment - What Made Milwaukee Famous

best music of 2007

there are so many lists out there (good and bad) about the best music of the year, but i don't think i've run across any better ones (and by "better," i mean closer to my own musical tastes) than the 2 great cds that were recently mailed to me by a friend of mine who is now in his sixth year of taking this task of musical compilation very seriously. and i'm very thankful for people like him! please email georgie with your favorite musical discoveries!

best of 2007:

night windows - the weakerthans
slow show - the national
is there a ghost - band of horses
either way - wilco
kreuzberg - bloc party
what would jay-z do? - ben lee
your parents living room - shout out louds
our life is not a movie or maybe - okkervil river
say it to me now - various artists
underwater (you and me) - clap your hands say yeah
closeness - wheat
cheaper than therapy - rogue wave
poetaster - miracle fortress
all my friends - lcd soundsystem
sweetly undone - sam baker
apartment story - the national
missed the boat - modest mouse
virtute the cats explains her departure - the weakerthans

newly discovered 2007:

harmonium - rogue wave
left and leaving - the weakerthans
girls in their summer clothes - bruce springsteen
long live the future - only son
crumble - dinosaur jr.
new york this morning - roman candle
it froze me - the mountain goats
there goes my outfit - the dears
setting forth - eddie vedder
ode to lrc - band of horses
breakfast in bed - dntel
just apathy - tally hall
a wooden horse - british sea power
one hundred resolutions - sundowner
impossible - shout out louds
talking in code - margot and the nuclear so and so's
jane, i still feel the same (demo) - matthew ryan
all the wine - the national
life's a song - patrick park

and here is the best of 2006 according to this same friend of mine:

"Cars and History" - Strays Don't Sleep
"The Crane Wife 3" - The Decemberists
"10 Minutes" - Human Television
"City vs. Country" - Mobius Band
"You Come and I Go" - Hotel Lights
"The First Song" - Band of Horses
"Before" - Richard Buckner
"Hindsight" - The Long Winters
"Woodland Hunter (Pt. 2)" - The Appleseed Cast
"Enough to Get Away" - Joseph Arthur
"Insomnia" - electric president
"Woke Up New" - The Mountain Goats
"Bleary Eyed" - Annuals
"Neverending Math Equation" - Sun Kill Moon
"Light Pollution" - Dirty on Purpose
"Saturday" - Built to Spill
"Chill Out Tent" - The Hold Steady
"With You" - Stars of Track and Field
"Never Ever" - The Hold Steady
"Strange Lands" - Hudson Bell
"I Will Be Grateful For this Day" - Bright Eyes

shins' concert last night

i saw one of my favorite bands, the shins, last night in north charleston, sc. the venue left a lot to be desired, and despite a short set, i really enjoyed getting my first taste of the shins' music live. their combination of melodies/vocals is pretty amazing. i thought some of their music might not translate very well live, but i was mistaken. all the cool noises that you hear on one of their studio albums show up in concert as well.

their most recent album, 'wincing the night away,' is my favorite album of theirs. it doesn't have a song as good as 'new slang' or 'caring is creepy,' but overall, it's consistently better than any of their other albums. i highly recommend it.

i just wished they played a little bit longer last night...

spoiled and spilt: a sunday to remember

so i hosted my first annual breakfast at wimbledon party today (more about the party in a second). any tennis fan who watched this match must have felt as spoiled as i did. what a great, great match we witnessed. roger federer is the best tennis player of all time. the case in point: rafael nadal outplayed him today for four sets (on roger's best surface) and played the best match i've ever seen him play. and still could not beat roger.

congrats to roger for tying bjorn borg's record of 5 straight titles at wimbledon. both players played unbelievable tennis today. for those who don't follow tennis too closely or know tennis statistics, it's usually a sign of very good play for a player to have a one-to-one ratio of winners to unforced errors. in over 3 hours of tennis and 5 long, tight sets, federer had 65 winners to only 34 unforced errors and nadal had 50 winners and 24 unforced errors. that is amazing tennis, just in case you didn't watch the match and blatantly see just how good these two were playing. the only difference between the 2 players was federer's serve. roger had 24 aces, and nadal only had 1. that was too many easy service games for roger, and it ended up biting nadal in the final set.

overall, though, i think this match may have been the turning point in nadal's career when he realized that he can beat roger, even on grass, even when roger is at the top of his game. sure, nadal lost the match, but the next 5 years should be awesome to watch. this rivalry is already up there with some of the great duels of all time. i think it's already more intriguing than sampras-agassi (even though agassi is my favorite player of all time), and is getting close to the borg-mcenroe-connors era in terms of talent, consistency, and skill. if nadal can slightly improve his serve and go for more aces, especially on grass, i think nadal is going to win some of these matches in the near future. sure, nadal has proven he owns roger on clay. but i think he can translate that success on the other surfaces as well. he's mastered grass-court tennis and is already one of the best of all time on clay. let's see if he can take his solid play at the french and wimbledon into the hard court season in north america the rest of the summer. the past couple of years, it seems as if nadal's play has dipped going into the u.s. open, and he's also suffered a few injuries that have held him back. roger is close to being the best of all time on grass. and nadal is close to being the best of all time on clay. the scary thing is that they both are the second best on the surface that the other one dominates. it's great to see them play in their primes at the same time!

as for the party itself, it was a complete success (with traditional strawberries and cream, of course, as well as some bacon, a potato-based frittata dish that georgie's girlfriend made that was delicious, and some banana nut bread a guest brought that must have been really good b/c i didn't even get to try it before it was gone).

but most importantly, i discovered a new drink. in addition to the bloody marys and mimosas that were served, the same guest who made the banana nut bread brought an english drink i had never encountered before called pimm's. we mixed it with sprite, mint, lemons, limes, and ice. you can also mix it with just tonic water, but i think the sprite did very well. the concoction tastes a little bit like sweet tea and is delicious. i highly recommend it!

after an afternoon nap, i went to see a very good band, built to spill, at the 930 club. they are a very talented band whose albums i recommend anyone to buy. go see them live if you have a chance b/c they certainly take their craft very seriously. a little too seriously, in fact, if you ask me. in stark contrast to the polyphonic spree show i went to last weekend, this band is not very energetic at all. they are highly talented musicians, but da%n it, guys, show a little emotion! your music is too good not to get the crowd into it a little. although the lead singer did have one funny comment, delivered in a dead serious tone of voice:

"i want to thank the stay-lows for opening up tonight. we've been fortunate enough to play with them three times so far. [pause]. although, they really are dicks. [pause]. but their music is so good it doesn't really matter."

i'm assuming he was joking, but it was close to sounding as if he meant what he was saying literally....

the setlist, for those BTS groupies out there, was:

Liar
Nowhere Nothing Fuc%up
In The Morning
Velvet Waltz
Time Trap
Mess With Time
Car
Third Uncle (Eno)
The Source
Wherever You Go
Fly Around My Pretty Little Miss
Else
You Were Right
Carry The Zero

Encore: Randy Described Eternity

the polyphonic spree

so i went to see this pretty wild dallas-based band this past saturday night at the 930 club. i highly recommend going to see them at least once, if not for their musical talent (which is, to be fair, about average, although the horns/sax/trumpet players are pretty darn good) then for their sense of what it means to be entertainers. i don't necessarily recommend buying every polyphonic spree album, but this band is definitely a concept band worth seeing live.

the spree purposely portray themselves as a large fun-loving cult. the lead singer literally has his own pedestal/podium that he walks onto when he's singing, and the entire band is dressed in the same outfits. usually, the outfit is composed of white angelic robes for everybody (which they did appear in on saturday but only for the encore), but lately the garb has been what appears to me to be black red-cross uniforms:

the band has over 20 members on stage at the same time. i was highly entertained with the 8 or so "choir" singers/dancers at the back and by the lead singer who really does a pretty good job as the head of the "symphony." the music is somewhat of a mix between classic rock, folksy jazz, and new-age pop. the performance lasted about an hour and a half, which was about a perfect amount of time to see them. their gig is certainly as energetic as any band i've ever seen.

apparently, there's a volkswagen ad that's currently running on national t.v. that plays one of their songs, but i'm not sure which one it is.